


Bruises

by Calacious



Series: Ho oku i [15]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bruises, Hurt/Comfort, Inspired by Music, M/M, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-08-19
Packaged: 2018-04-15 13:44:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4608975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calacious/pseuds/Calacious
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They've both got bruises; it's just that, right now, Danny's are visible.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bruises

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own the characters.
> 
> I was strolling through my documents tonight, hoping to find something that would spark writing, and I happened across this in my prompt folder:
> 
> "Bruises," by Train featuring Ashley Monroe
> 
> "These bruises make for better conversation
> 
> Loses the vibe that separates
> 
> It's good to let you in again
> 
> You're not alone in how you've been
> 
> Everybody loses, we all got bruises
> 
> We all got bruises"
> 
> It inspired the following story (and now I'm going to bed).

It's only been a few days since they last saw each other.

It feels like months, going on years.

Steve drinks him in with his eyes, and Danny can't help think that, today, they look like an overcast sky - a mixture of steel grey and aquamarine. He's missed them. Missed Steve, though it's only been two, going on three, days.

He feels like he's drowning. Can't help, but notice the dark circles, like bruises, beneath Steve's eyes. Like the man hasn't slept at all for the couple of days they've been apart.

Days that have been a kind of hell, Danny suspects, for the both of them, though _he_ was the one taken. The one the younger two Figueroa brothers decided to use as leverage to get their older brother released from prison.

As a hostage, Danny wasn't very cooperative. And it shows in the varying shades of purples and browns that mar his skin. He feels like an apple the fell from a tree.

He's never known when, or - if he were to listen to his partner, and ex-wife - _how_ , to keep his mouth shut, not even to save his life.

But, he's still alive, and the Figueroa brothers are now occupying side-by-side slabs, enduring an autopsy under Max's watchful gaze. Danny counts that as a win, no matter that he feels like he's been run over by a train.

_Cause of death_ \- Danny thinks, recalls the way his heart had skipped a beat, and his head swam with both relief and disbelief, when Chin and Kono swept into the room, guns blazing, to rescue him - _shotgun blast to the head._

It had been a thing of beauty. Violent, yes. Gory, absolutely. But, beautiful, nonetheless. And not the least of which was because of how the cousins had worked in tandem, and how Steve hadn't been the one to pull the trigger this time.

Cool, blue eyes spitting fire, Steve had slid across the floor, seemingly impervious to the bullets flying around the both of them- just like on TV - and reached Danny as the first Figueroa brother fell (a victim to Chin's shotgun, the back of his head exploding out behind him, splattering his brother's face with blood and brain matter).

Steve had only eyes for Danny at the time, as though it was just the two of them, there, in the dimly lit warehouse. No idiot criminals. No badass cousins. No loud exchange of gunfire.

And, still, Steve's eyes are locked on him.

The intensity of his gaze makes Danny dizzy.

"Babe," Danny breathes the word out, voice weaker than he intended it to be.

Danny knows how he must look. He feels shell-shocked; legs rubbery, feet like lead. He's numb, but his chest feels like it's on fire, and there's a stabbing pain in his side that's starting to get annoying.

Unable to close the small distance between them, Danny watches as Steve mentally catalogues each visible bruise on his face. The one that spreads from the edge of his jaw and disappears beneath the collar of his torn and bloodied shirt is particularly painful; Steve's eyes linger longest on that one, harden into a darker blue that makes Danny think of the sky before a thunderstorm in Jersey.

Mesmerized, Danny watches Steve swallow, Adam's apple undulating in his throat, and Danny has to look away, because all he can think about right now is how much he wants to bypass the obligatory hospital visit and lose himself inside of the arms of the man he loves. How much he wants to feel Steve wrapped around him - arms, legs - like a koala on a eucalyptus tree.

"Danno?"

Danny must've blinked at some point in time - maybe between watching Steve swallow, and comparing the man to a cuddly koala - because Steve is right there, in his personal space, the back of his fingers brushing across Danny's swollen cheek, making him wince, though Steve's touch is gentle, and it's more of an automatic response to the movement rather than pain.

He's beyond pain right now, anyway.

"If they weren't dead..."

Danny nods. "I know, babe."

And he does know.

It's a fire in the belly kind of feeling. He's felt it before. Finding Steve after Wo-Fat had tortured him. Unable to do a damn thing about it.

They've both got bruises. It's just that, right now, Danny's are visible, and Steve's aren't.

He knows what Steve's feeling, better than most, and takes comfort in that, because, unlike with Rachel, Steve understands that there are no words for this. That talking about it won't make any of it easier. That, even if he _did_ talk about it, the nightmares would still come, and what he needs right now are not empty words that border on promises that can never be kept, but physical reassurance.

Skin on skin.

Heat.

Kissing.

Sex.

Arms and legs entwined.

And mussed-up blankets that stink of their combined sweat and the heavy musk of sex.


End file.
